Am I being unrealistic?

[ace44]

About a month ago I bought a 1999 f-350 with 67k miles. It's in great shape. The question is am I being unrealistic expecting it to be able to start at -10 F? I have done a ton of searches here and see some have been able to get there 7.3 to start at much colder temperatures than -10F. I replaced the glow plugs, glow plug relay, injector o-rings, fuel filter, 2 new motorcraft batteries and synthetic oil. I read the sticky at the top of the forum several times and think that about covers it. Today at zero, it took forever to get it started. I don't think that at -10 it would have made it. When I am at home I can plug it in, but a day of snowmobiling won't allow me to plug it in. Any thoughts?

[Young-SC-Owner]

Mine fired unplugged at -15 but it was pissy......did fire right off tho


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[dieselcrawler]

are you using any fuel additive? If it's that cold, I would for sure... granted, the fuel being sold likely has some in it alread, but adding some more would not hurt, I like the stuff from PowerService, in gray or white bottles... I dump some in every tank when it's colder, but I never see temps as low as you're talking.

Also, did you let the glow plugs warm up for a bit before trying to start? From what I've been told, They will stay on for up to 2 minutes AFTER the 'wait to start' light goes out. So letting them burn longer will help the start up as well.

[Young-SC-Owner]

Usually what I do is get in turn key on, then settle myself in, take off coat, buckle up etch.... Then crank it over till she fires


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[ace44]

I am using additive, and I turned on the ignition let it set for two minutes and tried starting, after cranking for about 25 seconds I stopped and switched off the ignition and back on for two more minutes before cranking again. It finally fired on the 6th try and then died. On the 7th try it started and continued to run. Just seemed to be harder than I thought it should be with all the new parts. I was wondering if adding a tuner or chip would help?

[Young-SC-Owner]

No generally a tuner doesn't change the way it starts, personally it sounds like your gpr isn't working correctly even though its new. Can you verify voltage with a volt meter on both sides with key on?


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[ace44]

I will give it a try. Thank you.

[Young-SC-Owner]

Let me know what you find out


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[7.3HeavyHauler]

when you say oil changed, did you use 15/40 or something lighter? if you used that thick oil in that cold of an environment, then yes it will take forever to get it started using just the glow plugs, plugged in shouldn't be too much of an issue

[Schnot]

Its low mileage, but when injectors get worn out then it becomes hard to start in my experience. Once its running it will run fine, but starting can be a B*tch.

Once I put new injectors in my 250k motor, no more cold start problems down to zero. (Thats the coldest that ive seen here)